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With disdain, I noticed the bowl of red, foil-wrapped hearts at the grocery store check-out. My craving for chocolate was quickly suffused by my distaste for the upcoming excuse of a holiday. The one that involves copious amounts of red and cupid. I can’t say ‘Valentine’s Day’ without using the sneering tone that Seinfeld reserved for greeting his unwelcome acquaintance, Newman: Hello, Valentine’s Day.

It’s not that I’m anti-romance. My inherent condescension is because Valentine’s Day is the least romantic day of the year, and so it’s with a curled lip and a prolonged eye-roll I greet the buckets of red roses adorning storefronts – at a mere double the normal cost. As you know from my rant from last year, I have very little time for anyone who succumbs to this artificial excuse to buy a box of heart-shaped candy – unless it’s for your kid. Ah, there’s the rub. I just had a light bulb moment. I’ll get back to that in a moment.

With such unabridged and full-throttled cynicism, you might think I am either a jilted lover, or single. Or suffered a debilitating embarrassment one February 14th. Which I’m not, and haven’t, respectively, unless I’ve put such an incident in the back recesses of my mind, never to be thought of again, which is entirely possible.

Reflecting on Valentine’s past, I have some surprisingly beautiful (can I say heart-warming?) memories. In elementary school, which really was its heyday, since it involved chocolate with absolutely no guilt, my brown paper bag overflowed with heart-shaped Mickey and Holly Hobby valentines (and this at a time when giving each kid in the class a valentine wasn’t mandatory, merely encouraged). I would return from school to find a valentine, personally penned by my dad, and attached to an extra-large KitKat bar – only he knew the way to my heart was a mixture of handwritten adjectives and chocolate. In high school I received enough candy grams delivered to my classrooms to signal I was firmly in the middle of the popularity pack: not quite head table material, but permitted to enter the cafeteria, at least. In university, there was always a boyfriend to take me out to dinner, and not all of them were convicts. Losers notwithstanding, my dance card was full, and when you’re twenty this is important.

The evidence speaks for itself: at one time in my life, I had a childlike anticipation for Valentine’s Day that has been replaced with scorn. What’s happened in the interim, besides twenty years of marriage? Note I didn’t say wedded bliss, because those two words should simply never appear side by side.

Any parent knows an upcoming event – fabricated by Hallmark or otherwise – means one thing: a longer list of errands. To the groceries and laundry and cooking add a box of valentines for each child, chocolates to go with them (parents new to kindergarten, take note, we don’t only give cards these days), and then either 24 cupcakes or a fruit platter, depending on the teacher. The sight of that longer than normal list makes me cranky, but what makes me insanely mad is returning with my hard-purchased boxes of valentines only to learn that Spiderman cards won’t cut it for any of my girls, neither will Dora the Explorer, Barbie, or horses.

So when my youngest child insisted on making her cards this year, and this sentiment was readily and strangely agreed upon by her sisters, who rarely agree on anything, I could only do one thing. Hightail it to the local craft store.

Lo and behold, I’m back to the rub. It is my kids who have restored my faith in Valentine’s Day. As I toiled over our dinner (salmon, undercooked) and dessert (chocolate cake, which refused to leave its cozy pan so it was more like chocolate clump), my kids whistled away, cutting and pasting pink and red doilies. Besides the “stop copying me!” complaints, it was like a Norman Rockwell painting unfolding before my eyes.

Of course there’s a price to pay for being a regular Martha Stewart, to the tune of one thousand percent more than I would have spent on a box of SpongeBob valentines. But the value of not having to return the errant box of valentines to the store? Priceless.

Family harmony goes a long way. Building on the enthusiasm of my kids, I’m not hating Valentine’s Day this year; but I’m still opposed to the proliferation of florist rape and anything red velvet.

As the rain pelted sideways on the weekend, I stooped to throw a bouquet of roses into my grocery cart. An attempt to cheer up our joint on the darkest of winter days, add a little sunshine into the mix, mask the stale aroma of February. But I was horrified when I noticed the normal $14.99 price tag had been jacked up to $29.99, courtesy of my least favorite Hallmark-induced holiday, Valentine’s Day.

I was prepared to leave this one alone this week, to let bloggers and columnists wage their own wars with cupid, falling either in the pro or con category. If I were to predictably fall into the con category, you might think I am a washed up cynic, jaded by fifteen years of marriage, any romantic spark long since replaced by everyday realities.

And you would be right.

Suckers only need apply

My image on the line, I’m still prepared to go down this route to exploit the flower industry as the crooks that they are. Forget Hallmark, who at the very least can’t double the printed cost of their red and pink cards as February 14 rolls closer, the florists of this world are the biggest benefactors of this artificial holiday. I’m disgusted with the injustice of jacking up their cost of arrangements to double their normal price tag.

The last thing I have ever wanted for Valentine’s Day is flowers (honey, are you reading this?). I have long been a proponent of the “give me flowers any other day of the year instead, when they are half the cost” club. I cannot relate to all of those tweets and stories I’m reading about women who just want flowers for Valentine’s Day – “would that kill him”? What is romantic about receiving flowers on the day some marketer has deemed it romantic to receive flowers? Our collective lack of imagination has too many people resorting to being sheep, with the florists of the world being the lucky benefactors.

I would rather receive a new water bottle.

At least most retailers worth their salt have wizened up and offer pre-Christmas sales, so we don’t feel we are complete victims to the cause. If you are one of those smug people that goes around toting flowers at double the cost on Valentine’s Day, you may as well have “sucker” tattooed on your forehead, or “kick me” attached to your behind.

Contrary to how this sounds, I actually am romantic, but also pragmatic. Read me a poem on Valentine’s Day, instead. I promise I won’t laugh.